Home suite home at Raffles Makati, Manila

One of the two outdoor pools at Makati Raffles, which features a variety of spacious suites and residences for guests.

John Davidson

The Writers Bar features Anthony Palomo artworks.

My hotel room has six rooms!

When I sent my friends that quick message as I checked into the brand new Raffles Makati hotel in Manila, one of them replied, confused: “You mean your hotel has six rooms?”

No, what I actually mean is that my hotel suite has six rooms. Although, OK, it was perhaps a slight exaggeration. My suite might be on the smaller side for the latest Raffles offering, but it’s nevertheless clear that this hotel is serious about space. Even the junior suites boast a small study, a TV room, a bedroom, a walk-in wardrobe and a bathroom. Five rooms, or six if, like me, you count the toilet cubicle. (When travelling in Asia, I often find the toilet cubicle the most comforting room in the hotel, so it deserves to be counted, don’t you think?)

Then again, on the Raffles sliding luxury scale, five or six rooms to a suite is not really that impressive. The 30-floor glass building – in an upmarket corner of a municipality of Manila known as Makati – is divided into three distinct properties: the Raffles hotel; the Fairmont hotel for business travellers; and the Raffles Residences, essentially 100-plus serviced apartments for people staying nine days or more.

As you’d expect, the residences are the most impressive, numerically speaking. I counted 15 rooms in one residence suite (17 if you include the maid’s room and her en suite).

All of which is to reiterate, you won’t want for space in this hotel. Fresh, unconditioned air, however, is a very different matter. Unlike the hotel’s more charming colonial Singaporean sister, the Makati Raffles is ultra-modern, with windows that don’t open.

Space is one of the hotel’s strongest selling points – along with the personalised butler service, which gives you a single human face to the various concierge, housekeeping and valet services. The service is impeccable: that tantalising mix of not too much, not too little either. Just perfectly intuitive. Your butler will shine your shoes, unpack/repack your bags, run errands – even run you a bath, where the deep tubs in Raffles are terrific, and almost qualify as a stand-alone selling point.

He’ll also set up a candlelit dinner in your suite’s dining room. That’s if your suite has a dining room. The executive suites do – although it’s more a combined living/dining room, so technically you don’t get to count them as two separate rooms. I would, though. But that’s just me. . .

Manila go to

Drink

Buddha-Bar Manila: First opened in Paris in 1996, the Buddha-Bar chain is world class. Located at Picar Place, Kalayaan Avenue, Makati City; buddhabarmanila.com

Ayala Museum: On the corner of Makati Avenue and Dela Rosa Street, Makati City, this is considered one of the most important private institutions of Philippine art and culture. See ayalamuseum.org

National Museum: Established in 1901, this is the official natural history and ethnography museum of the Philippines. You’ll find it at Padre Burgos Drive, Rizal Park, Manila. nationalmuseum.gov.ph

Shop

Greenbelt: A five-minute stroll from Raffles, it’s certainly hard to beat for convenience – and retail choice. Spread across three hectares of parkland, Greenbelt makes shopping an even more natural experience for the devoted shopaholic. Makati Avenue, Makati City; ayalamalls.com.ph

The writer travelled as a guest of Raffles Makati, where rooms start from $405 a night. He flew Philippine Airlines, which offers daily flights ex-Australia, with lie-flat beds in business class.